I agree with you that kids deserve interaction. I definitely don’t send my kids off with a stack of books saying, sit here for hours and don’t bother me. We interact with each other all day long, it’s just not always related to school. We are mostly done with school by morning, and my kids are busy with art, reading, crafts, playtime, games, cooking, hobbies. My older boys have bball, speech club, work, etc. (My 8th grader likes to do math before bed, so he has more free time during the day.) My younger ones like to get up, get school done, and play. We also like field trips, park days, soccer, etc. There are a lot of homeschoolers here who are either extremely knowledgeable and/or do a great job of learning alongside their kids. I’m not one of them. One of my regrets is not outsourcing for my eldest child sooner. Instead of spending time with me trying to learn physics or relearn calculus, he could have benefited from having a knowledgeable teacher who could answer his questions with certainty, identify any gaps in understanding, and actually bring/math science to life. I outsourced with the next 2 and they did so much more than my eldest did at their ages and had so many enriching experiences - science fair, mock trial, debate, etc. I have found that I am good at giving my kids a solid foundation, helping them love learning, teaching them how to learn, feeding their interests, and seeking out resources and activities. I am not a great teacher for middle school and beyond. Also, my kids don’t want me to spend hours per day teaching them. A typical day for my 10th grader is up in the morning to do a few hours of schoolwork, off to DE courses, bball practice and weight training. Home for dinner, and depending on the day, he’ll hang out with us, go work as a referee, work on a project, etc. It’s fun for me to hear about things he is learning and doing that I’m not involved in. And of course, I would definitely help if he had any needs. I actually do think it is great to have a home where parent and kids are busy with school for 8 - 10 - 12 hours a day. I just don’t think that is ideal for *all* families, and I think kids can still have a homeschool experience even if their parents aren’t using the best materials or the best method, as long as what they are doing is working well for their family. Seems that OP has not found a system that works well for her and her kids.

Just to encourage you…. My kids do a lot of their work independently, and that has worked well for our family. I would not have been able to manage hours of one on one work per child. I truly admire moms who can do so, but that is beyond my ability. If my kids depended on me to teach and discuss most things with them, it would have been severely limiting for them. Once my kids are reading, I start teaching them how to read directions and learn from a text. I tell them it’s okay if you get these answers wrong, but I want you to try. I meet with each one of them once a day to look over their work, correct it, and explain things, as needed. I do more with a kid who is struggling in a particular area, but independence is the goal. My 6th and 8th graders are about 80% independent. My high schooler is 100% independent. I just check his grades periodically. My older kids are curious, self-directed learners who know how to teach themselves things I don’t know or have time to learn. One of my kids is on a national full ride scholarship studying biochemistry. My current high schooler won a national competition last year in architecture, a subject I know nothing about. My middle schooler (who has an LD) is trying speech competitions this year and chose a pretty heavy topic that he researched himself. I choose resources and curricula. I help keep my kids accountable to a schedule, and in some subjects (like math), I grade their work daily. Beginning in middle school, they do co-ops for some subjects. In high school, they take some DE courses and some co-op courses. Online courses have not been a good fit for us. We listen to audiobooks and do a few things together, but nothing time consuming. They like to get up and get started on their work without me - even my 2nd and 4th graders do this. And we all value leaving space in our day for their hobbies and extracurricular activities. I share all that to say, teaching kids to work independently can be good for *some* kids/families. Not all. There’s not one right way to homeschool. You have to find what works for you and your kids. As for the OP, I felt very overwhelmed with homeschooling after my 4th child was born. One day I sat down and prayed, “Lord, if You want me to homeschool these kids, You have to show me how to do it.” God gave me a very simple plan that I still follow 13 years later. I didn’t know my life would get so much more difficult - since then I’ve had 4 more kids, responsibility for an elderly parent, some hard times and shocking disappointments... However, even through extremely tough times, we have been able to continue. My advice would be to stop looking at what others are doing and pray that God will show you what’s right for you. I agree with others who say it is okay if you need to put your kids in school. I have read accounts from homeschoolers who feel their parents did not teach them well, and they have very sad stories.

The percentiles never showed up in my son’s online account, but I downloaded and printed the 2 page report, and the percentiles are on there.

Good to know I’m not the only one. When I googled, I found a college board chart from previous years with percentiles for 10th graders, so they should have enough data available. Hopefully, they can get our kids’ scores updated. Let’s keep each other posted.

Okay, never mind. Called college board and they filed a report and said they would get it updated.

Mine took it on they 24th, but I don’t understand why that would change anything. Last year, he got percentile ranking with his results. Is your student 10th or 11th grade?

What day did he take it?

My sophomore got his PSAT results back today. Under percentiles it says unavailable. Has anyone else experienced this? My older homeschooled kids received their percentile rank along with their scores.

I recognize it isn’t normal. Not a family trait as neither dh nor I struggle with organization. Only 2 of my 8 kids seem to struggle (one of those is now an adult). The only eval ds has had is with the developmental optometrist. During vision therapy, they did work on retained reflexes. When I said he didn’t have adhd, etc., I meant that he hadn’t been diagnosed with anything and didn’t seem to need any accommodations in class, such as extra time on tests, etc. His homework, tests, and classroom performance are above average. He gets up in the morning, does his work in a reasonable time frame, and doesn’t seem to have trouble staying focused. That’s why I said no need for testing. I did think it was an EF issue, but didn’t realize that was a diagnosable disorder. I have read That Crumpled Paper Was Due Last Week and Smart But Scattered. Would welcome any suggestions for other resources that might help.

@Quarter Note Thanks for the encouragement! He is a great kid and doing a lot of things well. Mainly, I am concerned because my oldest child was similar, except that in addition to being disorganized, he needed some help with time management. I thought he just needed time to mature, so I filled that role for him - creating schedules/checklists for him and keeping him organized. Everything was fine until senior year, when I realized he needed to transition to organizing himself. Unfortunately, he was at an age where he was not interested in learning this from me, and he had a more difficult course load. It all made for a very difficult transition to college. So I would really like to help my current 13 yo while he is expressing a need for help and open to receiving it. If I wasn’t helping him stay organized, he would really struggle with the ability to locate items and get them turned in.

Okay, thanks this is helpful! We will keep plugging away. I have been missing that step of letting him think for himself about where to put things, so I will start doing that. This includes organizing his homework and backpack for class. Right now, I am just telling him do this, do that. But I am missing that step of giving him time to think about what he needs to do.

@HomeAgain How old is he? Is he extremely disorganized or just a normal kid? Ds’ organizational issues seem extreme compared to my other kids. For instance, if I say go put this book away, the book will end up in some random place. I have to look at him very directly, and say very specifically, “Go put this book in the gray milk crate upstairs.” Then I’ll say where are you supposed to put this? The gray milk crate. He goes off to put the book away, and there is a 50/50 chance it will make it, lol. If I later go check the milk crate (which has been set aside as a place to hold school books), I might also find a sock in there, a basketball medal, etc. With my other kids, if I say go put this away, it goes directly into the designated place where they put their things every day. Not so with my 13 yo. I don’t know what system my 16 yo uses. He is not exactly organized, but has no issue keeping up with his work, turning it in, etc., so I don’t worry about it. I guess I am just wondering a few years of intense habit building is going to make a difference, or if there’s some way I should approach this differently.

Have any of you been able to help an extremely disorganized child learn to be more organized? I would love some tips and advice. My 8th grade ds (4th of 8 children) is extremely disorganized. He is taking math, science, and writing at a co-op, as well as doing some subjects at home. He does not have any trouble getting himself started on schoolwork, completing his schoolwork, staying focused, or managing his time. He works well independently. He does not have any trouble learning the material or taking tests. His co-op grades are high A’s. I have read a couple of books and have been working with him on a notebook system, as well as giving him a dedicated space to work, and a milk crate to hold his books and materials. His co-op teachers give detailed checklists for homework and provide folders for kids to hand their materials in, etc. I currently sit with him the night before co-op, making sure each item is in the right folder and everything gets in the backpack. The issues are ds’ work space is always extremely messy, piled with papers, books, and non school related items. When it is time to get his backpack ready for co-op, he might have Monday’s homework on the table, Tuesday’s is stuffed in his backpack, Wednesday’s is upstairs somewhere. Sometimes, he can’t find a book. Sometimes he has completely overlooked one portion of an assignment. Or his writing assignment might still be on the computer, unnamed and difficult to find. Several weeks he has gone to class without his ID badge even though we discussed how it should remain in his backpack. We’ll later find it on the floor somewhere. He is genuinely trying and has expressed a desire to be better organized. He did vision therapy for a processing disorder a couple of years ago, and made a lot of progress. No attention issues, adhd, etc. No need for further testing or accommodations that I can see. He completes his work well and in a reasonable time frame. Sometimes, he will do odd things like start his work on the back of a sheet of notebook paper. Visually, I just don’t think he notices/remembers that the holes go on this side of the paper or this white margin should be at the top. This typically only affects things like note taking. Sometimes, he’ll put a folder in his backpack upside down. These are the only lingering visual issues that I have noticed, other than spelling issues (which have improved great deal). His handwriting is neat, and his writing skills are fine. His teacher used a recent paper as an example for the class. Any tips for helping him organize himself? My oldest child was also disorganized, and I believe I helped him for too long. It made college very difficult for him. My other kids don’t seem to have this issue.

This is a valid concern. My ds had a prof like this last semester. He had an A the week before finals, given the few things she had graded. He was concerned, and talked to me about it, but since he had an A, I wasn’t too worried. A few days before final grades were due, she dumped a bunch of grades into the system, he ended up with a VERY low B. He was lucky he didn’t get a C in the class. He was pretty frustrated as he had no opportunity to receive feedback and make adjustments throughout the course. And yes, I question the validity of the last minute grading. I’d have your son visit office hours for feedback, and if he still has concerns, drop the class.

My son who did this had a visual processing disorder. We took him for an eye exam with a developmental eye doctor, and he did a few months (maybe 6?) of weekly vision therapy. He also did about 5-10 minutes of eye exercises per night as homework. I was a bit skeptical, as it takes a while to see results, but the difference is night and day. It was 100% worth the time and money, as it has made everything so much easier for him. I would start with a developmental eye exam.

I don‘t disagree with anything that has been said, but every family is different. Our family was very busy with sports, and we enjoyed it, but I did have to find a routine that worked for us. I also have 8 children, so dealt with pregnancy, childbirth, nursing, etc. for many years. My husband travels frequently for work and is unavailable to help, and we have no help from family. When it came to homeschooling my older kids, I could never handle a high volume of work, but I could be consistent with a little. For the elementary school years, we used a workbook curriculum for math, handwriting, language arts (grammar and spelling). My kids knew that every day, they were expected to complete one lesson in each book. Then, sometime during the day, I would call them to me one by one to correct their work and explain anything they didn’t understand. This all took me under 2 hours. Sometimes my kids got their work done before I even got up in the morning. One week, I had to go out of town and my 9 yo did all her work for the week without me. My point is, they knew what was expected, and it wasn’t much, so they got it done. With the rest of their time, they would play, go outside, draw, legos, read, work on little craft projects, etc. We did not do any Latin, science projects, etc. We listened to audiobooks during quiet playtime or in the car. We listened to Story of the World on CD, and they did the coloring pages (not the map work or activities). Sometimes during the summer or over Christmas break we would do art projects or other fun things. There were seasons when we did a circle time with memory work, etc., but that wasn’t consistent. It was all very simple, but doable for us over a number of very busy, sometimes difficult years. When the kids were in 7th grade they started taking science, writing, etc. at a drop off co-op, where I paid for classes and didn’t have to volunteer. They were each well-prepared and did very well. In high school, I looked for activities, camps, etc. that supported their interests. I didn’t try to do it all. I have older kids who have high SAT scores, gold medals on the National Latin Exam (one got a perfect score), A’s in DE courses (including calculus), etc. One of them wrote a book for fun (unpublished). My 19 yo is in college on a full ride and is a biochemistry major (straight A’s except for one A-). My 16 yo won a national architecture competition this summer and spent the last few days at a conference in Portland that was part of his prize. He always surprises me with interesting things, like learning to draw art on shoes. These are things they were interested in - nothing I did. I was just a facilitator. We have tweaked some things for the younger ones, but my point is that you have to find what works for you. I was never going to be that mom doing in depth history and science projects, intensive conceptual math programs, etc. I admire moms who do those things. I am just not capable of it. But I could lay a really strong foundation from which my kids could do their own thing. I enjoy the busy sports lifestyle and would not have been happy staying home a lot. If I had Grandma next door, I might let my kid get his school done and go hang out a bit…

I ran into this problem with my eldest kid, and after that I made sure my kids had a state ID. After the first notary refused to notarize the student ID form, I basically asked if any FB friends knew someone who would help me, and found someone who agreed to notarize the form.

I have thought of that. It is a good idea, and I’ll probably do that if I don’t find anything else I like.

My older kids learned to create one, two, and three-level outlines using Writing with Skill. I am using a different writing program with my younger kids that doesn’t teach outlining. Do any of you know of a book or workbook I can use just to teach outlining? I know I could do this on my own using books, but if there is a workbook I could use to teach it, that would make things so much easier.

Is it okay to submit college essays in the form of a poem?

He is in an NCAA controlled sport, but I’m not sure he will go D1 or D2. I looked at all the NCAA stuff for my dd a few years ago, but probably need to look again just in case. Thanks for mentioning it!

I use A Beka phonics without the teacher’s manual or flash cards. We just use A Handbook for Reading, Letters and Sounds K5, and the K5 readers.

Too Small Tola (series by same author as Anna Hibiscus) The Year of the Book Heartwood Hotel

Make sure foreign language isn’t required for his degree plan. If it is, some colleges let you substitute 2 years high school FL for 2 years college FL. If it’s required for his degree plan, I’d have him take FL in high school. If not, I would skip it.

Thanks for sharing! This is helpful to hear.